G200 flight crew reports getting very low during a night visual approach after a 12 hour duty day an...

Narrative:

During the landing phase after a 12 hr + day of duty and this being the 5th leg. I was acting as the pm. We got cleared for the visual approach. Both of us had the field insight and got set up for the pattern maneuver. My partner was the PF. As we maneuvered on the base leg I started noticing that we were getting a little low on altitude. Field elevation was 1;000 ft. My partner had set 1;500 ft on the altitude selector on the flight director as the autopilot was engaged. Suddenly the tower controller queried us about our altitude and advised us that MSA in that area is 2;100 ft. My partner immediately commenced a climb back to pattern altitude; as I asked the controller for the current altimeter setting. Landing was uneventful. No GPWS warning was ever issued by the aircraft system. I definitely believe that fatigue played a major role in this case. It was the last leg of a very long day and also visual approach to a night landing. In the future I would ask ATC for vector to the instrument procedure to add additional assistance into the equation. Also will make sure we double check as a crew the pattern altitude during our approach briefing.

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: G200 flight crew reports getting very low during a night visual approach after a 12 hour duty day and five legs. The Captain recognizes that he is only 500 FT above the field elevation at the same time the Tower issues a low altitude alert.

Narrative: During the landing phase after a 12 hr + day of duty and this being the 5th leg. I was acting as the PM. We got cleared for the visual approach. Both of us had the field insight and got set up for the pattern maneuver. My partner was the PF. As we maneuvered on the base leg I started noticing that we were getting a little low on altitude. Field elevation was 1;000 FT. My partner had set 1;500 FT on the Altitude Selector on the Flight Director as the AutoPilot was engaged. Suddenly the Tower Controller queried us about our altitude and advised us that MSA in that area is 2;100 FT. My partner immediately commenced a climb back to pattern altitude; as I asked the Controller for the current altimeter setting. Landing was uneventful. No GPWS warning was ever issued by the aircraft system. I definitely believe that fatigue played a major role in this case. It was the last leg of a very long day and also visual approach to a night landing. In the future I would ask ATC for vector to the instrument procedure to add additional assistance into the equation. Also will make sure we double check as a crew the pattern altitude during our approach briefing.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.

Attributes
ACN	1181675
Time
Date	201406
Local Time Of Day	1801-2400
Place
Locale Reference	TYS.Airport
State Reference	TN
Environment
Flight Conditions	VMC
Light	Night
Aircraft 1
Make Model Name	Gulfstream G200 (IAI 1126 Galaxy)
Operating Under FAR Part	Part 91
Flight Phase	Landing
Route In Use	Visual Approach
Person 1
Function	Pilot Not Flying First Officer
Qualification	Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP)
Person 2
Function	Pilot Flying Captain
Qualification	Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP)
Events
Anomaly	Deviation - Procedural Published Material / Policy Inflight Event / Encounter CFTT / CFIT

G200 flight crew reports getting very low during a night visual approach after a 12 hour duty day and five legs. The captain recognizes that he is only 500 ft above the field elevation at the same time the tower issues a low altitude alert.